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Full Transcript:

Note: This is an original transcript–edited for sense, length, and clarity.  If you have any questions or concerns, please email our host, Doria Lavagnino, at doria@sheventurespodcast.com.

Intro: 

Doria Lavagnino: Are you someone that feels like you need a road map to start living your purpose? If so, today’s episode is for you. This woman traded a stable career in healthcare administration to pursue her passion: mentoring girls of color to be workplace ready and willing to believe that they can attain their professional aspirations. The passion to mentor started in college and continued while she earned her master’s degree and — she would do it, at that point, during evenings and weekends. She knew that it was something really important to her. She landed a full-time job continued to mentor [and] work. Then [she] had a pivotal moment when she took action and applied to a highly competitive residency at The Broad Center at the Yale School of Management. She said to herself that if she got in — according to statistics, 2 percent of women of color get into this program — that it was a sign that she was meant to do what she felt passionate about, which is mentoring women of color. Fast forward, she got into the program. She started a [nonprofit] business called LOV, Ladies of Virtue. She is here to tell us about her journey and the fact that LOV as an organization has mentored more than 1,000 girls in its 10 years of existence. Jamila Trimuel, welcome to SheVentures!

Jamila Trimuel: Thank you so much for having me.

Doria: That was the longest intro I think I’ve ever done, but I felt there was so much to cover — my goodness!

Dad’s Affirmations

Doria: I wanted to start by talking a little bit about your childhood [and] where you grew up. Is there a specific memory that stands out for you?

Jamila: Anytime I think about my childhood, I have to start with one of my memories of my dad. My dad used to always say, “You are an African girl. You can do anything you put your mind to.” That was something he just said on an everyday basis — when he put me to sleep, when we were in the car driving. Honestly, I didn’t think much of it. I thought all parents poured into the lives of their kids [and] said these mantras [and] affirmations. [I thought] everybody was doing it and it was not a big deal. That [was] something that stuck with me. I realized [that] when I was about a junior in high school that, unfortunately, that’s not the case.

I had a friend whose father was killed through gun violence. I had friends whose moms were in their lives, but not in a positive way. When I was in high school was one of [the] first times realizing that having those positive role models in your life can change the trajectory of your life. That’s what made me start to mentor in college. I saw the differences between those who may have had those positive role models, whether it be parents, teachers, mentors, and whomever, or those that didn’t. I saw firsthand how their lives took a downward turn.

Doria: Did your dad have a college education?

Jamila: When I was in high school, he graduated from the University of Illinois. He got his master’s from Northwestern in business. He’s a materials engineer. [He] always pushed me towards college. My granddad was working in a factory, and my grandma was an administrative assistant. College was super important for [my dad] because he was the first generation. When I was born, it was not an option. “You’re going to college.”

Doria: Yeah, absolutely. I love how every day he kind of instilled that confidence in you. It is incredibly meaningful to have that kind of environment.

Getting into Mentorship

Doria: In a TEDx Talk that you gave called Make Today Your Saturday, you speak about how going to college was never optional for you. You speak about how different that was from many of your peers. Can you provide context for our listeners [about] how this impacted you and how it manifested in your wanting to mentor young women?

Jamila: Yes, as I mentioned, realizing firsthand the differences between those who had positive role models — parents and teachers — and those that didn’t. That’s what really prompted me to start mentoring. When I went to the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, I started mentoring when I was a sophomore. After that, I started to become a member of other organizations that had a youth component like the Chicago YMCA [and] things like that.

After I graduated from college, I saw some of my mentees continue to struggle in different areas. There was one who was having a hard time looking for a job. She was about 16 years old. I said, “I can help you find a job. Just send me your resume and let me send it out.” Under work experience, there was a bullet point that said “looking for a job.” That doesn’t belong on a resume. I took a step back and said, “Well, how did this resume get out of her home?” It was a graded assignment. Nobody sat down with her to say, “This is not the proper way to do things.” There were so many different scenarios like that. That’s what pushed me toward education. 

I loved what I was doing at the hospital; I was a project leader in the strategy and business development department. I enjoyed what I was doing, but my passion was mentorship. 

I will never forget when I was in college [and] my professor said, “Choose your career based off of what you would do for free.” That’s what I was doing for free. After seeing so many different situations like what I just explained, that’s when I realized it was time to switch and pivot to go into the educational industry.

How Healthcare and Activism Led to Mentorship

Doria: Right, having the realization. I believe you got your master’s degree in healthcare administration?

Jamila: Yes, I went right after my undergrad. I went to Rush University and I have a master’s in health systems management. That’s what prompted me to start my career at Northwestern Medicine in the business development and strategic planning department.

Doria: What interested you about that job in particular?

Jamila: When I was in college, in addition to mentoring, I was also volunteering as pretty much a community organizer for a healthcare grassroots organization. We would go out in the community and we would find out that there were people who were being put on house arrest for not paying their medical bills. We would go to the hospitals and have these signs outside the hospital: “This hospital is treating these patients wrong.” Community organizing and being a community activist have been in my blood since college. I knew that’s what interested me about healthcare.

I was also volunteering at a domestic violence shelter, where I would have to go to the emergency rooms to convince women who were battered to come back to our shelter. I had a lot of exposure to the healthcare system with those two volunteer opportunities. That’s what interested me in starting my career in healthcare. In general, I knew I had a strong business acumen. But because I was volunteering at this healthcare organization, I said, “Well, how about I combine business with my healthcare volunteer opportunities to try to see if there’s something that I can tap into?”

After graduating from undergrad, I got my master’s at Rush University. The cool thing about that master’s program was that every summer and semester, they wanted you to try a different internship. [You wouldn’t] have the same internship for the two years of the master’s program, but you should have like four to six internships. You can really see what you want.

I had tons of internships. There was one in particular that I loved and that was the strategy department. It was like being an entrepreneur because you got a chance to say, “Okay, when you’re thinking about strategy, you’re thinking about this is where we are now in terms of our hospital but we want to be like the best hospital in the state. What are our gaps? What are the strategies that we need to get there?”

I found myself leaning toward those types of projects. That’s how I ended up realizing that I wanted to go into the strategy department.

Doria: I love that. I don’t talk about myself often, but I tried law school and I dropped out after five weeks. I think initially we don’t want to listen to the voice that’s telling us or we feel it’s not practical. There are so many different reasons. I feel like everything does happen for a reason and the experiences that we have to help us build who we are today. You explain that so eloquently when you’re talking about how healthcare exposed you to different aspects of education that you wouldn’t have otherwise seen.

One of the things you also spoke about in your TEDx Talk [was] the health effects that you experienced. I don’t know if this was when you were still working at the hospital [but] you started to have heart palpitations. You had gained weight. You were eating a lot of processed and fast foods. I think a lot of people fall into that. What happened and how did that change?

Jamila: Yeah, so I think the last part of my story was when I was talking about how I realized through the mentee who sent me her resume, how I wanted to go into the field of education. That’s when I ended up deciding to leave Northwestern. I realized that my passion was more in line [and] that God was shifting me to a different way. Though I love healthcare, my life was being shifted to education. It was becoming very clear to me.

Getting into Broad Residency

Jamila: That’s when I applied to the Broad Residency. [It] was so unique because it [had] three components to it. You got a chance to travel around the country learning about inequalities of the school systems, to get placed in a full-time management career and education, and you received your master’s in Educational Leadership. The catch was only 2 percent [got] accepted in the country.

Doria: Very competitive. Was it 2 percent women of color or just 2 percent overall?

Jamila: Overall chance of getting in period. The people who were accepted were all people of color. When I had it, there were predominantly people of color. There were other demographics as well — white men and women — in my course [but] there was a 2 percent chance of getting in [at all]. The majority of the class was people of color.

Doria: How big was your cohort?

Jamila: It was about 35; 35 people are accepted every year. The unique thing about that program is Eli Broad started it and he’s no longer with us. He has since transitioned, and when he [did] he gave the program to Yale.

Doria: I was wondering about that.

Jamila: Yeah, that’s the connection with Yale. When I was doing it, I was one of about three people — from a class of 35 — from Chicago. It’s a national program. We met up every quarter in a new city to learn about the inequalities of the school systems.

Her Personal Health Story

Jamila: At this point, I left Northwestern and I was working at LEARN Charter School as a senior manager of new schools, as well as parent and community engagement. I’m, at the time, at the height of my life. I got accepted to this 2-percent-chance [program] and [that] was a blessing. Then, I had a late-term miscarriage. I was 19 weeks. Just think, baby shower invites and all of that.

Doria: Right, so hard.

Jamila: That’s when things crashed for me. It was an interesting time in my life. You think that all is well and open up doors and make things happen. Then, on the flip side, you have the most horrendous thing that has happened to you — having this late-term miscarriage. That’s where the depression set in. That’s where I started to eat more and unfortunately, with the job that I was placed in, I also had about a two-hour commute each way. I was in the car quite a bit. That’s when I ended up gaining about 50 pounds over the course of the year. It was a life transition for me, dealing with so many different areas and things that were going on in my life.

Doria: Yeah, stressful. That is a lot. Do you have any tips for women who go through miscarriages? How were you? How did you grieve?

Jamila: Yeah, well for one, I took time off of work. I think so many of us don’t do that. We try to work through it. I took my short-term disability. I think we sometimes press through when we shouldn’t [and] when we should take a step back and take that time for ourselves. That’s number one. Number two, leaning into the support of my husband, friends, and faith, as well. I just focused on myself and healing — going through that process before I even went back to work. Then, three, working out for me was very helpful. 

I know that may sound weird but I found a community when I found a gym. It was a true community. There were other women who were like-minded [and] going through similar things — not in terms of what I may have faced or not. Working women who were just trying to make it happen. There were women who were on all walks of life [and] going through different scenarios. That really helped me. I’m being around women who you can be transparent with. There’s something about that oxygen flowing in your body when you start to work out, sweating and doing activities and it’s not feeling like working out.

I was with that community. I really enjoyed it. I enjoyed being with them. I was able to do things that I wasn’t even thinking about doing before. That really helped me. That’s when I lost weight. When you lose weight, you feel better about yourself and buy new clothes. It was a combination of everything, but that really helped me think about having a healthier lifestyle and mindset.

Doria: I love that. I can identify with what you’re saying because there’s something about exercise and community that also build your confidence. I was in my 40s [when] I returned to the gym after 25 years. It took a lot for me to go into a gym at all. I was uncomfortable and out of shape. I felt like I was going to be judged. I had 3,000 reasons why. It’s interesting that like we find our way, we find what works [and] if we are committed to finding it.

Doria: Yes, it’s so true.

Jamila: So true, absolutely. I was committed. I didn’t know how to find my way back — but through all the things that I mentioned, I truly felt better after going through that working out process with the community. I felt better coming out of it than I did prior. It was a life-changing experience for me.

A Vision Board Dream Come True

Doria: Yeah, and so you did the program for two years. You earned a master’s degree in education that is fully paid for.

Jamila: Yes, it was through the Broad Educational Leadership, and it was fully paid for. If you do vision boards or write certain things that you want in your life — that was actually on my board when I wanted to get another master’s but didn’t want to pay for it. The first master’s was very expensive. I forgot all about me writing this down until after I graduated from the Broad Residency. I happened to find my previous notes from like eight years before and that was in there — to get a master’s education for free. That was a true blessing.

Starting Ladies of Virtue

Doria: Absolutely. Bring us to how you conceptualized and then started Ladies of Virtue — how did that happen?

Jamila: Yeah, so I started Ladies of Virtue when I was still at Northwestern. As I mentioned, some of the mentees that I had been working with — every time I would go to a different organization, I would have a couple of mentees that would come along with me. It was 2009. I had shared [with some girls] that I was thinking about starting a mentor organization more so as a passion project. I never had it in my mind, in a million years, that I would start an organization that would later employ me as an employee. It was supposed to be more of a passion project with the girls that I was currently mentoring. I started in 2009 [by] putting together the business plan, getting the website, and some of the more administrative aspects.

I launched on October 1, 2011. That was when I was still at Northwestern, again, mentoring the girls who I had, personally [brought with me] When we started in 2011, we started with six girls. Then, the program just kept growing every year. 

Then, when I got into the Broad Residency program, that program is only two years. After two years, you’re either employed by the company that you were placed in or find a new organization so that you can pursue your career at that point. They provided us with a business coach. This was when I had about six to eight months left in the program. The business coach was like, “Well, what’s your plan? A, B, C, and D? We need to start jotting this down to create strategies. Be honest.” I’m not that type of person; I’m the type of person that would have applied to like 30 jobs to make sure I had one. 

I realized that I was not going hard to try to find this employment opportunity. I knew I didn’t want to stay where I currently was. I went back to my husband to say, “You know what, I think God is saying, ‘Let’s see where Ladies of Virtue is going.’” At that point, we were at about a $40,000 budget [and] about 25 girls. My husband agreed that for one year I could stay focused on Ladies of Virtue just to see how it would grow.

Doria: What happened?

Jamila: That’s how I ended up starting Ladies of Virtue and then going full-time in 2016.

Doria: And it’s a nonprofit, correct?

Jamila: Yes.

Doria: Okay, and you ended up going full-time in 2016. A couple of things that I take from that is you didn’t just jump in at all, which some people sometimes do with startups. You were very methodical in how you planned for your future. I think that is awesome and a great takeaway. It must have been quite a balancing act, doing all of that at once.

Jamila: Yeah, I had saved up six months of savings. I don’t know if I recommend just saving the six months. Then, I actually did just go cold turkey from that standpoint cause I wasn’t working anywhere else. I did have my husband who was very supportive at that time. Looking back, I probably should have worked a part-time job or something.

I ended up cashing in my pension because I still had my bills, student loans, and a few things I needed to do. My husband took care of the household bills. I still had my personal bills, so those six months went by really fast. There were some major sacrifices that I had to make. I ended up not getting a salary with Ladies of Virtue until toward the end of 2018 — really closer to 2023 of not getting a salary.

That was a tough time in our marriage, even though I had a plan. I almost feel like you can’t plan enough because I thought I had it — I was like, “Oh, I have my plan to do this for a year.” I would say we started building momentum in that second year. It took about two years for Ladies of Virtue to go from this unknown, smaller grassroots. We’re small but we were starting to get partnerships that built more awareness after about the second year of me working full-time. That’s when I realized, “Okay, we can do this.”

Doria: This has legs. It’s interesting you say that too because I hear that often. I think everyone underestimates the amount of time something is going to take. It’s so common and ends up taking double or triple the time and resources that you had allocated. I guess that also really tests your passion, too.

Jamila: Yes, very true.

Marketing and Partnership

Doria: I also want to talk about getting known and the partnerships because that’s organic growth. Did you have to learn how to do grant writing or how does the financial piece of your organization [fit]?

Jamila: Oh yeah, I had to learn everything. If you take one of those StrengthFinder surveys, the good thing is my top five strengths — one of them is “become a lifelong learner,” which means that I love reading books, webinars, and all that. That’s good that that’s one of my top five because I had to learn everything.

I knew the strategy because I was in the strategy department for eight years. I knew how to write a business plan. I knew how to set a vision, write strategies, and accomplish those goals. I didn’t know anything about marketing. I didn’t know anything about raising money, grants, or anything.

During those first two years, I continued to walk in this vein of continual learning. I was definitely in everybody’s conference, reading everybody’s book and everybody’s webinars, learning specifically about grant writing. I even hired a grant writer who ended up being fraudulent. It’s just so many pitfalls, ups and downs. It relates to entrepreneurship. I took grant writing, program evaluation, and marketing classes. I took data classes, networked, and all of that to try to do as much as I possibly could to get Ladies of Virtue to the next level.

Doria: Let’s talk a little bit about the marketing piece and the partnership piece. How did that start to take form in the first year or two?

Jamila: Yeah, I would say a couple of things. One, we had already had a partnership with Project Management Institute, Chicagoland Chapter back in 2012. They were one of our very first partners — leaning on them a lot to help create awareness. Our girls ended up starting to speak at their monthly dinners once or twice a year. That provided us with more exposure because you’re speaking in front of 200 [people], and the memberships that [they] have; they’re coming from a variety of different industries. That really helps us, as well. That got us some groundwork to create more opportunities to speak up and out.

I would say our most prominent partnership in Chicago started with City Clerk Anna Valencia. She was such a natural. She had such a good heart for young women. I served on one of her committees. The first step was we did a career exploration with her. She was really impressed with our girls. She was like, “They’re asking better questions than any career exploration that I’ve ever had. These are the best group of girls. They were so prepared.” They kept inviting us to different opportunities. That really opened up doors, because she allowed me to speak at one of her press conferences with [the] Lieutenant Governor at the time.

One person creates the fireworks. Then, it’s almost like a snowball effect, where it starts as a little snowball as it rolls down the hill and gets bigger and bigger. That one person believes in you, provides you with more opportunities and then you do well. Then, they provide you with more opportunities. You never know the person that’s going to get you to that next level. I always tell my girls how you do one thing is how you do everything because I could network with one person and nothing happens, but I put forth the same effort with everybody and then it ends up coming out the way it has.

Doria: Right, what I was going to say is that I don’t feel like you’re giving yourself enough credit because you had to have the energy and wherewithal as an introvert. Networking is kind of exhausting to me. You have to be on all the time. You did that.

Jamila: That’s true. I think I’ve been trying to share with our girls, “Think about networking as relationship building, too.” If you change [and] look at it from that perspective, it kind of helps a tad. I’m not just networking for networking’s sake, but [saying], “This is a nice person. I would like to get to know her better.” When you think about it that way, it helps to frame how you approach that relationship.

Making Women of Color Leaders

Doria: Yep, so much more authentically. In what ways does LOV identify and help marginalized girls of color and help them become leaders?

Jamila: As I was mentoring and getting to know the girls that I was serving personally, one thing I saw was that they love to talk to you, to adults, and share what was going on in their life. That’s when I realized that mentoring piece was critically important.

Another thing I noticed was that they were oftentimes very passionate about [what was] going on in their schools — issues going on in their communities. It’s almost as though they didn’t see themselves as a leader; they saw everyone else as the leader. When they looked in the mirror, they didn’t necessarily see themselves as a leader. That’s when I realized that Ladies of Virtue should focus on mentoring and leadership.

We started with six girls back in 2011. Now, we’re almost 12 years in and we’ve served thousands of girls and their families. We helped them in a variety of different ways.

We prepare our girls for leadership in three ways: character development, career readiness, and civic engagement. Career development is so critically important because a lot of people don’t realize how we got our name. Virtue by definition means moral excellence. What we’re saying is that to be a strong leader, you have to have a strong character. You have to have a strong character, as well. When you’re not in the room, what are people saying about you? Can people believe your word? Are you a young lady of integrity?

We talk about that in terms of career readiness, helping them prepare for their future careers, exposing them to STEM, exposing them to coding, and all these other different opportunities that we have within Ladies of Virtue.

Then, civic engagement. They work in partnership with other girls and Ladies of Virtue to identify topics that they’re passionate about. Then, they work to create awareness about that specific topic in the communities or schools. That’s how we prepare our girls for leadership.

Doria: I love that. A couple of questions stemming from that: How long, typically, does a young woman stay with you? I was thinking about everything that you’re saying and I’m like, “These are all great not only experiences but things that one can add to their resume.”

Jamila: Yeah, absolutely. In our Saturday Institute, many of the girls stay about three years but many much longer, as well. We have girls that have been in our program for eight or nine years. We’re only about 12 years in. There’s [definitely] longevity there.

We just started going into the schools. We have now 17 program sites in the schools. [It] just depends on how long those schools partner with us. It could be anywhere between one year to about three years. On average, we see about three years when the girls are in the program. It’s been great seeing them grow.

Working with Corporate Partners

Doria: You must also have corporate partners that agree to hire or mentor these young women as they’re learning.

Jamila: We have corporate partners. ComEd is one of our corporate partners, for example. They will be taking 20 to 30 of our students to their STEM site. That’s to train and expose young girls to the world of STEM. They’re going to be talking to STEM professionals and so forth.

We have corporate partners such as Northwestern. They’re still a partner of ours, I used to work there. They’ve stayed connected after all these years. We have so many other partners throughout the city: PepsiCo Foundation, Bright Star Community Outreach, and so forth.

Future Aspirations

Doria: Do you have any aspirations to have your organization grow nationwide?

Jamila: Yeah, so that is a part of our longer-term strategic plan. Right now, we’re operating off of our 2022 to 2024 plan. That’s to hone in on what we’re doing in Chicago. We want to truly focus on building our infrastructure, building our team, and making sure that we have a unified programmatic experience throughout all the sites that we’re currently serving. Then, starting in 2025 and beyond, we’ll start to seek out other opportunities. We’ll see more to come. 

Doria: That will be so cool. Oh, I can’t wait to see you in New York. That will be exciting.

Jamila: Yes!

A Mentee and a Big Difference

Doria: You have mentored, as you said, thousands of women and girls to date. I’m sure each of them holds a very special place in your heart. This is going to be a difficult question, but is there one woman who you think back to, and she really, for whatever reason, made an impact on you?

Jamila: There are so many, but I will call out Dina who started with us. She was one of the first six girls in our program. We helped her get into college and so forth. She was a first-generation college student from the South Side of Chicago. She had two mentors at Ladies of Virtue, — one being Faith, who was a doctorate student at the time at Northwestern University. She’s now Dr. Faith Summersett. At the time, she was a student and had reached out to her mentor about her senior year. They had stayed connected throughout [Dina’s] time in college, but she reached back out to her to let her know, “I just applied to all of these master’s programs. I got denied.” She was like, “I should have told you about these programs [and] opportunities. I applied and got denied from every single program. I need some help. I need some more similar guides.” Faith was like, “Oh, my goodness. Come to Chicago after you graduate. I will help you sort out this next stage in your life.”

Faith realized, after getting her degree, that degrees [are] not able to connect [you] with professors to get lab experience. That happens a lot with women of color — that professors don’t look like them. They [aren’t] able to build that rapport. Dina was not able to get that experience and [that’s] what you need to get advanced. Faith allowed Dina to volunteer in her lab while she was at Northwestern.

For two years, [Faith] worked with her in terms of what type of questions to ask during the interview, what to wear, and things of that sort. Then, Dina applied again. This time, she applied to Ph.D. programs because her mentor was a student in a doctorate program. Dina hadn’t thought about getting a Ph.D. because no one in her family graduated from college — let alone [earned] a Ph.D. She applied to about three or four programs [and] got accepted to all of [them].

Doria: Oh, my gosh.

Jamila: Now, she’s about to graduate from her doctoral program in social psychology at Ball State [University]. I think that is such a testament to that exposure [of] having someone who looks like you, who’s able to build that rapport, bring you into the lab. Some of these things you don’t think about are true barriers when you are seeking advanced education. That’s the power of Ladies of Virtue.

Doria: Oh, that is incredible! 

Misconceptions and Marginalization

Doria: I’m so infuriated by the idea that if you don’t look like a white man, you are put in a different category. What would you say are the biggest misconceptions that you encounter about marginalized women or girls of color?

Jamila: There’s some recent research from Georgetown University that shows that Black girls are viewed as needing less nurturing, support, and comfort. We know that that perception is not reality, but that is a huge misconception that sometimes people may have about Black girls.

Sometimes due to stereotypes of Black girls or women, that we go through so much, it’s like, “Oh, you’re so strong.” We hear that all the time. I embrace that. Yes, I am a strong Black woman, but that doesn’t mean I don’t need support, resources, [and] opportunities.

Even in Chicago public schools, a lot of people don’t realize that the most suspended in the school system, unfortunately, it’s a Black girl. A lot of people don’t realize that.

Doria: I didn’t realize.

Jamila: Instead of just running to discipline, we do need to focus on what type of care and support this demographic means. In this case, it’s the Black girls. What do we need to feel supported and address the issues that are happening right now? That’s the biggest misconception. “They’re good, I don’t have to worry about them.”

In the meantime, the highest suspensions write the highest disciplinary rates. When you see that in the schools, that also equates to higher juvenile detention. It equates to higher human trafficking rates and so forth. We don’t want girls to be kicked out of school. We know if they are getting kicked out and disciplined in the schools when they’re not in school, they are falling prey to those other areas. That’s the biggest misconception that we’re trying to fight now.

A lot of times, the media will focus on Black boys. Not to say that they don’t need that support, but let’s focus on everybody who needs [it]. Not enough attention is being focused on some of the issues that Black girls are facing. That’s the biggest misconception in communities. 

Instilling Confidence

Doria: As we wrap up, leadership requires a number of skills, one of which is confidence. How do you instill confidence in the girls that you work with?

Jamila: The biggest thing in terms of instilling confidence is being transparent with them. That’s number one. Sometimes they may look at us and say, “Oh, you have all this confidence and you’re good. This is why I need help. I see you go out there and speak. I can’t speak in front of people. I get nervous. I’m the strange [and] weird one.” I’m like, “No, no, no, no. I still get very nervous when I go out and talk to people.” I talk to them about how I have to practice a million times. If I don’t, I’ll stumble over my words. I get nervous. That’s number one — instilling confidence [and] being transparent.

I was bullied in sixth grade. That hindered my confidence up into high school. I let [people] know that we’re just like them. I don’t have this huge superpower that I was ready to speak in front of 500 people. I wasn’t born with a microphone in my hand.

Then, two is meeting them where they are. We’ve had girls like Elisia. I had her speak at an event and I thought she was going to use notes. She stood up, memorized everything, and was speaking from the heart. It was absolutely perfect. So, meeting them where they are in terms of providing opportunities for Elisia to do that. Then, there may be someone else — one of my other [girls] came up to me at a talent show. She was about nine years old. She said, “My mom put me in [it]. I did not want to be in this show. Maybe when I get older, I will participate, but it won’t be today.” That’s what she told me. I said, “You know what, how about we walk up to the front, I’ll tell people what you’re presenting and then we walk back to our seats?” She said okay. We walked up there. I shared her name, [her artwork] and we sat down. Afterward, I came up to her and said, “Well, how was that? You stood up in front of all those people. That was great! How did you feel?” She said, “I felt really good.”

Doria: It’s so much emotional intelligence on your part. I think having learned a lot about education and people — because that would not necessarily come to me — it’s smart the way that you handled that. It instilled confidence in her. It didn’t turn it into a shaming experience, because then anxiety can continue to build as you try to avoid doing things. I love that.

Proactive Steps in Helping Others

Doria: Question before we let listeners know more about where they can find you and Ladies of Virtue, for people who are listening to this episode and want to start mentoring, what are proactive steps that they can take to be helpful to others?

Jamila: I would say, number one, is this a passion of yours? Identify where your passion lies and then align opportunities with your passion and the capacity that you have. We have these opportunities to mentor for a day where you can pour into a young person — maybe at a speed networking event or an organization luncheon. We have opportunities where you can mentor for a year, two years, three years, or longer opportunities with the girls. Even for our incoming mentors, look at your capacity.

What you don’t want to do for a young person is maybe you got fired up because you heard a podcast, speech, or what have you, and you signed up for three months. Next thing you know, you disappeared — not because of any ill will or intention. Sometimes you get busy with a work assignment. What you don’t want to do is slowly disappear from a young girl’s life in such a short period of time after setting expectations. That can do more harm than good. I always start there in terms of mentoring.

I also try to make a habit of smiling or even saying a nice word to young girls. Just being a friendly face can be helpful. I always like to stress those small things you can do. I think people think, “Oh, I have to mentor for five years to be a good mentor.” Honestly, it could be you taking that time for an hour or a day to pour into a young person’s life that can change that person’s life forever, as well.

Doria: I love that. If you could, tell listeners more about where they learn about you, about Ladies of Virtue, and what you’re doing for this Women’s History Month.

Learn More About Ladies of Virtue

Jamila: Yes, learn more about Ladies of Virtue. We have volunteer opportunities and mentoring opportunities. If you would like to donate, please go to our website, lovchicago.org. We would love to have you tap into Ladies of Virtue and everything that we’re doing.

For Women’s History Month, we have two things. One is the This Black Girl Campaign, where, in the spirit of our civil rights activist women’s leaders of our past, we are highlighting women and young girls who have overcome significant barriers to become successful in their own rights. We’re sharing their stories on social media. We’re going to have events throughout the month, as well, where you get a chance to listen to their stories. That’s important for us because we want to dispel misconceptions and share some of the stories that our girls are facing.

We also have a career readiness luncheon that will happen in a few weeks where we are exposing our LOV Sisters to a variety of different careers. They’re going to be participating in a fashion show. It’s going to be nice. We always like to keep it creative and fun.

Doria: That sounds great! Do mentors have to be in the Chicago area or can they be virtual?

Jamila: The majority of our opportunities are here in Chicago for mentoring, but we do have other ways to support our girls through our Friends of LOV Council, for example. We do have a couple of members who live outside of Chicago [and] outside the state. They’re still able to participate because they’re raising small amounts of money. When you put everything together, it helps to support our girls — helping to raise money for laptops for our high schoolers and so forth. They’re able to do that virtually. We have a couple of opportunities that are virtual with us.

Doria: I want to thank you so much for coming to SheVentures today, telling your story so authentically, and sharing so many wonderful tips!

Jamila: Oh, thank you so much for having me!